1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a lamp holding apparatus, a backlight device for a display device including the lamp holding apparatus, a display device including the backlight device, and a liquid crystal display device including a backlight device for a display device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Since a liquid crystal panel used in a liquid crystal display device of, for example, a liquid crystal television or the like is not self-luminous, it requires a separate backlight device as an external lamp. The backlight device is installed at a back side of the liquid crystal panel, and generally includes a base made of a metal with a surface on a liquid crystal panel side opened, a number of cold-cathode tubes accommodated in the base as lamps, and a number of optical members (diffusion sheet and the like) arranged on the opening portion of the base and efficiently releasing light emitted by the cold-cathode tubes to the liquid crystal panel side, and includes lamp clips for holding the cold-cathode tubes, which have a slim elongated tube shape, with respect to the base.
As one example of the lamp clip described above, the lamp clip disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2001-210126 is known. This lamp clip is made of a synthetic resin, and includes a mounting plate arranged along an inner surface of a base, a locking portion which protrudes to a base side from the mounting plate and is inserted into a mounting hole of the base and is lockable to its peripheral edge, a lamp holding portion which protrudes to an opposite side from the locking portion from the mounting plate and is capable of holding a peripheral surface of a cold-cathode tube so as to surround it, and a pin which protrudes in the same direction as the lamp holding portion from the mounting plate. The pin protrudes to a larger extent than the lamp holding portion, and therefore, when the lamp clip is mounted to the base, an operator performs a mounting operation by gripping the pin.
Incidentally, when a mounting operation is performed, it is necessary to insert the locking portion into a mounting hole of the base while gripping the pin. However, since in the above described lamp clip, the pin is arranged at an intermediate position between both the locking portions, and both of them are disposed at the positions separated from each other, the locking portion is difficult to position with respect to the mounting hole, in addition to which, the mounting plate easily bends when the locking portion is inserted into the mounting hole, and therefore, operability is not favorable and problems occur.